Basics

What is Less Wrong?

Less Wrong is an online community for discussion of rationality. Topics of interest include decision theory, philosophy, self-improvement, cognitive science, psychology, artificial intelligence, game theory, metamathematics, logic, evolutionary psychology, economics, and the far future.

How much of this reading do I need to do before I can contribute to Less Wrong?

Not that much. As soon as you've got a good grasp of what's expected, contributing should be OK. But do your homework before making a post on something that's already been discussed. And if you're getting voted down, that could be an indicator to read more and talk less.

Sequences

What are "the sequences"?

The sequences are the original corpus of posts written by Eliezer Yudkowsky on Overcoming Bias that functioned as seed material for Less Wrong. They are a massive and extremely thorough introduction to methods of rationality, rationality-related-fields, and how to avoid common rationality-related mistakes.

I'm already a pretty rational person. Can't I just skip them?

The sequences have some pretty advanced stuff. If you don't already know about Bayesian probability, evolutionary psychology, philosophy of quantum physics, decision theory and the other topics covered, you may find them useful.

Less Wrong user Academian has created an "abridged introduction" to Less Wrong for people who already have a background in science that you may wish to check out.

How difficult is the material in the sequences?

It's relatively straightforward. They are written for amateurs without any assumed previous knowledge in the subjects covered.

Do I have to read the sequences before posting on Less Wrong?

It's a good idea. If your post involves topics that were already covered in the sequences you should build on them, not repeat what has already been said. If your post makes mistakes that were warned against in the sequences, you'll likely be downvoted and directed to the sequence in question.

On the other hand, we're well aware that it can take a long time to read through several years worth of blog posts, so we've labeled the most important as "core sequences". Looking through the core sequences should be enough preparation for most of the discussions that take place here. We do recommend that you eventually read them all, but you can take your time getting through them as you participate. Before discussing a specific topic, consider looking to see if if there is any obvious sequence on that topic.

Where can I read the sequences?

Site Mechanics

How do I make a comment?

After the text of each article is a comment box - click in the text field, and you will be able to write a reply to the article. To reply to a comment, click on the "Reply" link and a comment box will open for you. In either case, you can format your new comment using a variation of the Markdown syntax. A few commands are summarized behind the "Help" link (it shows extra text without opening a new window or browsing away from the page); the most popular are:

Bold and italics: **bold** and *italics*

Links: [link text](link URL)

Note that URLs with parentheses often come out wrong - type a backslash ("\") before each close-paren to fix these.

Blockquotes: > quoted text

Is it worth commenting on ancient posts and long-dead threads?

How does voting work?

Less Wrong is based on the Reddit codebase, and you can vote submissions and comments up or down just like you can on Reddit. Depending on how comments are sorted, those with higher scores may be more visible. Comment and submission scores also affect a user's karma.

How is karma calculated?

Your karma is equal to the sum of the scores of your comments and discussion posts plus ten times the sum of the scores of all your blog posts in Main. Note that your karma can be negative. Posting something lame to Main is a good way to get negative karma, so tread carefully.

Why do I want high karma?

You need a few karma points to create a discussion post (to prevent spam) and at least 20 karma to create a blog post in Main. Beyond that, karma is mainly useful for letting people know how great you are.

How do I make a submission?

Register for an account, then click the little "Create new article" link under your username in the upper right corner of the page. On the article creation page, a dropdown below the text box will allow you to choose between Discussion and Main. See this question on knowing which one to choose.

What is shown on the "New" page?

The "New" page shows everything that a particular user can see. This includes drafts by a user as well as all of the public articles on LessWrong.

So don't worry if you see a draft that you've written in here, only you can see it (until it's submitted to the LessWrong category).

How do I get my post on the front page?

Posts are "promoted" to the front page by the editors on the basis of substantive new content, clear argument, good writing, popularity, and importance. The posts with karma totals in green disks instead of gray circles have been promoted.

I deleted an article. Can I undelete it?

It is not possible to undelete an article if you delete it. However, it is only marked as deleted, not completely removed.

There is no easy way to get to deleted articles. However, if you know the article's permalink, then you can always get to it. (Try looking through your browser history.) There will be a small note near the title of the article marking it as deleted. Note that, while you can edit the deleted article, it will still be marked as deleted.

Instead of undeleting an article, it is always possible to create a new article and to copy-and-paste the content from the deleted article into the new article. Any formatting from rich editing should be copied correctly.

Part of the website is broken. What do I do?

Your options include: Post in the latest Open thread, or lodge a help ticket with the github source code for the lesswrong website. If you have some coding skills and some spare time, we welcome assistance with the project of improving the site.

Please do not vote solely based on how much you agree or disagree with someone's conclusions. A better heuristic is to vote based on how much a comment or post improves the accuracy of your map. For example, a comment you agree with that doesn't add to the discussion should be voted down or left alone. A comment you disagree with that raises important points should be voted up.

In some cases it's probably acceptable to vote in order to register agreement or disagreement. For example, you can vote someone's proposal up or down based on whether you think it should be implemented.

Why did I get voted down?

Hopefully, it wasn't just because someone disagreed with you, but rather because you made some sort of reasoning error, or because your comment was poorly written, content-free, or ignorant of what's already been said on the topic in the Less Wrong archives (especially the sequences). Feel free to mention you're a new user and ask why you got voted down, or post in the welcome thread if you have a question related to karma or voting.

I'm worried I'm wrong about something I said. What will happen if I admit I made a mistake?

We will still like you! In fact, you may find that you're respected even more than before, because you're known to be capable of changing your mind. See the post It is OK to publicly make a mistake and change your mind for more on this. We're very keen on enforcing it as a community norm.

When should I post in Discussion, and when should I post in Main?

The general rule is: Main tends to move slower than Discussion, and posts in Main typically get more exposure. Use this opportunity for additional exposure wisely.

These traditionally go in Discussion:

a link with minimal commentary

a question or brainstorming opportunity for the Less Wrong community

Main exists to encourage people to submit longer posts (on the order of a couple thousand words or more). Shorter posts *may* be appropriate for Main, if they are exceptionally high quality. Other factors that suggest you should post in Main include:

Your post discusses core Less Wrong topics.

The material in your post seems especially important or useful.

You put a lot of thought or effort into your post. (Citing studies, making diagrams, and agonizing over wording are good indicators of this.)

Your post is long or deals with difficult concepts. (If a post is in Main, readers know that it may take some effort to understand.)

You've searched the Less Wrong archives, and you're pretty sure that you're saying something new and non-obvious.

The more of these criteria that your post meets, the better a candidate it is for Main.

Note that you can move posts in between Discussion and Main after submitting them. One strategy is to submit your post to Discussion initially, then move it to Main if it's well-received.

A third option is to post in the most recent open thread - a weekly catch-all thread for asking questions, general discussion, and miscellaneous topics.

I strongly disagree with Less Wrongers on something. Can I write a top-level post about it?

Yes, if you do your homework first.

Less Wrong users definitely want to know if they're wrong about something. After all, we're trying to become less wrong, and we appreciate being corrected! Good contrarians are more than welcome. Thoughtful and informed contrarian posts are almost always voted up, sometimes massively.

But generally if a position is the "Less Wrong consensus", it's because there's already been a fair amount of discussion, and the consensus is LW's collective current best guess. If you say something that's already been said, or say something that's obviously incorrect in light of other points made on the topic, your post may be voted down for being noise.

In particular, if you want to do any of the following, consider doing lots of homework and ensure you're not making any standard mistakes:

claim your god exists

argue for a universally compelling morality

claim you have an easy way to make superintelligent AI safe

If you have a question regarding a "consensus" view, or don't want to do any homework, consider posting in an open thread.

Any other thoughts on writing posts?

Some thoughts:

Keep in mind that your post may be linked to from other websites. Make it accessible and interesting to non-LWers if you can do this without compromising the content.

"this post starts off with a specific example - an instance of the concrete-abstract writing pattern in which you state the example first and the generalization afterward. This is one of the most common bits of nonfiction writing advice I dispense: "Open with the concrete example, not the abstract explanation!"" -- Eliezer Yudkowsky.

I'm arguing with another user, and I don't think we're getting anywhere. What should I do?

The Less Wrong Community

Where did Less Wrong come from?

In November 2006, Eliezer Yudkowsky, an AI researcher at the Singularity Institute (now MIRI), began posting about rationality on economist Robin Hanson's blog Overcoming Bias. In February 2009, Yudkowsky's posts were used as the seed material for a new community website, Less Wrong. Overcoming Bias remains Less Wrong's "sister site".

What organizations are involved with Less Wrong?

Less Wrong is built and maintained by Trike Apps, a consultancy based in Melbourne, Australia.

Other organizations involved with Less Wrong include

CFAR, the Center for Applied Rationality. They do rationality training and some other stuff.

MIRI, the Machine Intelligence Research Institute. They work to ensure that the creation of smarter-than-human intelligence has a positive impact.

Most Less Wrong users consider religion to be a settled issue, so before arguing for theism, we recommend you get curious and read some solid atheist arguments. Also make sure you aren't privileging the hypothesis. For example, if you found a knockdown argument for why there has to be a god, why would it be the particular god described in your religion's holy books? (Now don't go figuring out why it has to be your religion's god! You don't want to have the bottom line already written. Instead, start to figure out what sort of god, if any sort in particular, would be implied by your knockdown argument.)

Why do Less Wrong users seem to agree on so much?

Let's assume for a moment that Less Wrong is actually achieving its goal of helping users think more rationally. If that's the case, we should expect users' beliefs to reflect their own individual prior beliefs less and less, and the actual state of the evidence more and more. Especially as users share evidence with each other.

Of course, just because Less Wrong users seem to agree on something doesn't mean it's correct. The group belief could be a byproduct of an information cascade, or plain old groupthink.

So think for yourself, always be questioning, etc. And if you've read a fair amount about something and you still disagree with the apparent LW consensus, speak up so other users can learn from you and possibly update!

Meetups

What are Less Wrong meetups like?

It depends on the meetup. The default is probably one or more groups of people sitting around chatting. Other possibilities include board games and structured rationality exercises.